A sales cadence is a calendar for one lead: which day you reach out, by what channel, saying what, and when you stop. This page gives three 21-day cadences, one each for a cold lead, a lead who has a quote, and a lead someone referred, with the exact day, the channel and a line of wording for every touch. Most published examples are timelines with boxes and arrows. These have the words in them.

All three belong to a fictional business, Granite Peak Epoxy in Salt Lake City, owned by Anselm Kruger, which coats garage floors for homeowners and apartment complexes. The cadences are for a small business following up by hand or setting it up once. They mix email, phone, text and LinkedIn, and each ends with a rule that tells you when to quit. For the email-only version, see a cold email follow-up sequence that doesn't nag.

Cadence 1: a cold lead, seven touches in 21 days

The lead is a property manager at Elmwood Terrace, an apartment complex with 40 garages. Anselm has never spoken to her. Email leads; text stays out, since she hasn't given her number or consent.

  • Day 0, email: "Subject: Garage floors at Elmwood Terrace. Hi Carol, I coat garage floors for apartment complexes, and Elmwood's garages looked like they have oil staining. Would a 10-minute call this week help? Tuesday at 10 or Thursday at 2?"
  • Day 3, email in the same thread: "Adding a photo of a similar garage we did last month, in case it helps."
  • Day 5, phone: ask for her by name; if you get voicemail, leave 15 seconds: "Carol, this is Anselm at Granite Peak Epoxy, about the garages at Elmwood. I'll try again next week."
  • Day 8, email: "One question: who handles garage maintenance at Elmwood, you or the owner's office?"
  • Day 12, LinkedIn: a connection request with one line: "Anselm from Granite Peak Epoxy. I wrote you about Elmwood's garages."
  • Day 16, phone: a second call, a different time of day.
  • Day 21, email: "I'll close the file on Elmwood unless you tell me otherwise. If the timing changes, reply anytime."

Stop rule: any reply ends the cadence and starts a conversation. A "not interested" ends it for good. No reply by day 21 moves her to a "check again in 90 days" list. Cold email must follow the CAN-SPAM Act: accurate sender and subject, a physical address, and a working opt-out, which belong in each email's footer.

Cadence 2: a quote you sent

The lead is a homeowner, Tamara, who got a $3,200 quote for a two-car garage after a site visit. She asked for the quote, gave her number for this job, and is warm. The cadence is slower on the surface and heavier on text and phone.

  • Day 0, email: the quote, with a line: "Here's the quote we discussed. I'm holding Friday, October 30 for you until Monday."
  • Day 2, email in the same thread: "Making sure the quote arrived. Questions on anything?"
  • Day 4, text: "Hi Tamara, Anselm at Granite Peak. Did the quote look okay? Happy to adjust anything."
  • Day 7, phone: "Hi Tamara, calling to see if you've had a chance to look at the quote, and whether anything needs to change."
  • Day 11, email: "Here's a smaller version: one-car garage and a clear topcoat, $1,750. Same crew, same warranty."
  • Day 15, text: "Hi Tamara, my schedule fills up around the holidays. Want me to pencil you in, no commitment?"
  • Day 21, email: "I'm closing this quote on my end. If you'd like it reopened, just reply."

Stop rule: a yes books the job; a "not now" gets a date to check back; a no ends it. Texts go out only within daytime hours and only because she gave you her number for this job. The broader logic for the days between messages is in how often to follow up with leads, and a service-business version of the whole path is in a sales follow-up sequence for service businesses.

Cadence 3: a referral lead

A realtor, Nate, sends Anselm a client, Yuki, who just bought a house with a stained garage floor. Referral leads move fastest, and the first contact is in hours, not days.

  • Day 0, email and call, within hours: "Hi Yuki, Nate Whitlock suggested I reach out about the garage floor. Do you have 10 minutes Wednesday at 4 or Thursday at 10?" Then tell Nate you've reached out.
  • Day 1, text if she hasn't replied and gave her number to Nate for this: "Hi Yuki, Anselm from Granite Peak. Nate said you might want a quote on the garage floor."
  • Day 3, email: two time options and a photo of a recent job.
  • Day 6, phone.
  • Day 10, email: "A quick question: is the floor in good shape, or are there cracks? It changes the price."
  • Day 14, text: a short nudge with a time.
  • Day 21, note to Nate: "I couldn't connect with Yuki. I tried a few ways. Thank you for the introduction anyway."

Stop rule: any reply stops it. On day 21, report back to the referrer, which keeps the relationship. The wording for both sides of a referral is in how to follow up on a referral.

The arithmetic that makes people give up

Add up the time. For cadence 1: four emails at about 5 minutes, two calls at about 4 minutes, and one LinkedIn request at 3 minutes come to 31 minutes per lead. If Anselm has ten cold leads running at once, that's 310 minutes, a little over five hours, and that's before logging anything. This is the point where most owners quietly quit the cadence at day 8 and chalk it up to "no reply." The fix isn't to try harder. It's to shrink the cadence you can keep up, or have a tool send the emails and prompt you for the calls.

Slow industries need longer gaps

Twenty-one days fits a service business where people decide in a few weeks. If you sell to buyers who need approvals, such as commercial roofing, school districts or multi-property owners, double the gaps and make it 42 days. If you sell something urgent, like emergency repair, compress it to a week. The rule of thumb: the cadence should end after about twice the time it normally takes a customer to decide.

Log every touch in one line

After each touch, write one line: date, channel, outcome. "Oct 12, call, voicemail." The log keeps you from calling twice in one day, and it gives you the truth on day 21 about how many tries a lead really got. For picking between channels at each step, should you follow up by text or email has a grid, and follow-up text message examples has wording. The subject lines are in follow-up email subject line examples, and a first-week plan for doing this inside Gmail is in automatic follow-up emails in Gmail.

A cadence only works if someone actually sends day 12. Rocketship finds the buyers, emails them from your own Gmail, follows up, and books the meeting on its own. Plans that get you customers start at $24.99 a month (Launch), and every monthly plan starts with a 7-day free trial, card required. See how the AI workers run the follow-up days for you.